Is AI helping employees, taking over tasks, or replacing older tools?
Task assistance and task replacement have different meanings.
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The answer
Among AI-using businesses, 43.7% reported supplementing or enhancing employee tasks, 10.1% reported performing tasks previously done by employees, and 10.6% reported introducing new tasks. Among businesses reporting employee-task replacement, 70.9% described the number replaced as small.
How to read this finding
A task can move to AI while the employee remains employed. The separate software-and-equipment question identifies changes to existing technology, which are different from changes to employee tasks. Multiple responses to the task question can overlap.
Detailed AI supplement: collected November 17, 2025–February 8, 2026; released April 23, 2026. Past-use questions look back six months unless otherwise specified; future questions look forward six months from the survey response.
Did AI replace, assist, or introduce employee tasks?
In the last six months, did this business use Artificial Intelligence (AI) to do any of the following?
| Response | Businesses (%) | Standard error (pp) |
|---|---|---|
| Perform a task previously done by an employee | 10.1 | 0.15 |
| Supplement or enhance a task performed by an employee | 43.7 | 0.15 |
| Introduce a new task not previously done by an employee | 10.6 | 0.22 |
| None of the above | 51.5 | 0.15 |
Multiple responses are possible; percentages need not add to 100.
How many employee tasks did AI take over?
In the last six months, how many tasks previously done by employees were instead performed by Artificial Intelligence (AI)?
| Response | Businesses (%) | Standard error (pp) |
|---|---|---|
| A small number | 70.9 | 0.73 |
| A moderate number | 22.0 | 0.99 |
| A large number | 7.1 | 0.47 |
Did AI take over operations from software or equipment?
In the last six months, did this business use Artificial Intelligence (AI) to perform operations previously performed by existing software or equipment?
| Response | Businesses (%) | Standard error (pp) |
|---|---|---|
| Yes | 16.1 | 0.17 |
| No | 59.3 | 0.27 |
| Do not know | 24.6 | 0.17 |
A practical business conversation
Map a workflow into steps before choosing a tool. Identify which steps need a person’s judgment, which can be assisted, and which could be automated with review. Record quality and turnaround time in a small pilot; the survey itself does not calculate those gains.
Task replacement cannot be converted into a count of jobs lost.
What this evidence cannot establish
The task-extent answers are small, moderate, or large categories. They are not exact task counts, work hours saved, or the number of employees displaced.